This game looks pretty cool! I'd be happy to be a tester if you need one.

I'm planning to do some alpha testing soon (in a few weeks). I will post details here when everything is ready for that - just need to add some more basic things into the game like crafting and maybe some dungeons

Now that I have more time for Xcylin, here is an update on what I'm currently working on:

I noticed a slight jitter when the sectors are getting build that really annoyes me. So I'm doing a lot of benchmarking to find the source. So far I found out that the state manager update most likely causes the jitter by taking more then 11ms in some situations. In normal conditions (no new sectors are being built) one loop just takes 0.9ms. I already accounted for 4ms of that 11ms but the other 7ms are still a mystery.

I think this all has something to do with the biome generation: when a sector is built for the first time the according biom/shaper method is called that allows to create trees/plants etc. This also updates in some situations other sectors (e.g. when the leafs of a tree expand to a different sector) so a lot of sectors have to be recreated and that might lead to the jitter.

Maybe I have to split the mesh of a sector into smaller parts but I already tried that once with 16x16x16 block parts that only resulted in a huge framerate drop. So possibly I have to go with 16x128x16 block parts. I think I will have to experiment for a while to get this right. Too bad I really want to add more features and not debug for some days

Nevertheless I have decided to use this thread as a kind of blog for the development of Xcylin as long as I have no time to create a website. So check this page from time to time if you want to stay up to date. I will also announce the alpha test here.

Also: here is a recent screenshot of an underground jitter testing site on Xcylin.

Time for a small update: I'm currently working on the story/items in the game and also on adding water to Xcylin.

Also the water (and light within the water) looks quite good I still need to implement the correct physics simulation - I hope JBullet won't make it too complicated for me in this case. Also I need to play around a bit more with the flow of water so that it feels natural.

Over the last couple of weeks I tweaked a lot of code to prepare Xcylin for a nearing alpha release. Though I'm still not completely happy with the optimizations as there are still some small lags from time to time - but I already have plans to counter them.

Recently I perfected the water spreading algorithm so that water now flows quite like it should. It is of course still an approximation of the real behaviour of water. Here you can see it in action:

While experimenting with the water algorithm I realized that it would also be possible to create some sort of acid that burns through rock. So I made a small test of that and it worked as expected (without any change to the engine itself - yeah!). Only problem is that I didn't add a level of saturation.

So my first test with a cube of acid just burned all the way down to the bottom of the level. My next thought was to build a pool with a floor that won't be corroded by the acid and it turned out nicely. Here you can see how that looked like after some time:

Of course also in this case the acid never would have stoped burning through the rocks

Nice video.Though the "water" seems to be more of a jelly. While watching the video, I would have expected that the bottom layer flows faster than it currently does. The water stacks a block and then goes to the next one. Non-intuitive. Also the water in the container emptied itself vertically before horizontally. Will You be keeping it like that ?

“The First Rule of Program Optimization: Don't do it. The Second Rule of Program Optimization (for experts only!): Don't do it yet.” - Michael A. Jackson

I second the jelly water. Also the stacking. The container emptying thing is I think just an effect of these things though. Change them and I think it'll be a lot smoother. Still looks very nice though.

Your jumping seems really "floaty". Are you going for a low gravity effect? If you are, it seems good. But if you aren't that would get old really fast, no offense!

You are right, I'm not fully happy with the jumping either since I let the physics engine handle it (and yes g is at 9.81m/s^2). On the other hand I want to have physical forces that can be applied to the player. You see, the core problem is that a normal person is not able to jump two meters high - so it feels unrealistic even it is in fact correct.

Maybe I have to fake some faster motion by applying any additional force or completely controlling the velocity by myself (as I already do with x/z-movement). I then would have to add the applied forces myself.

Nice video.Though the "water" seems to be more of a jelly. While watching the video, I would have expected that the bottom layer flows faster than it currently does. The water stacks a block and then goes to the next one. Non-intuitive. Also the water in the container emptied itself vertically before horizontally. Will You be keeping it like that ?

The water moves not in real time but with the speed of the physics engine (60FPS at the moment) but this is by design to keep the used CPU cycles at a reasonable level. And you are right, that makes it look a bit like jelly. But you have to understand that the player can place water anywhere(!) in the (currently) 50x50x32x32x128 blocks world and then the simulation has to take care that it behaves in a way like water. It is also important to know that each change in water level makes a retesselation of the given sourroundings necessary, so this is not a simple process. But I agree that it is not 100% accurate - the question is, is it possible to make it more accurate without making it unreasonable complex and slow? If you compare it to Minecraft for example, then you see that water is also not simulated in any completely accurate way, just because it would most likely not be feasible.

And to explain why the water moves vertically first is simply because gravity is the bigger force here. I implemented it to first check if a block is below the water and if so the water should flow down, then if there is still water in the current block it would flow in the x/z-directions. You can check the javscript code below that I currently use - any suggestions are very welcome

The water javascript code: http://pastebin.java-gaming.org/5c2af2e3581The onChange() function is called every time when a block is changed that is a neighbor of this block or the block at the position of this block has been changed. You get four parameters:

world - the world to access all world relevant stuff (like terrain, player, npc ...)

blockInstance - the instance of this class that is adjacent to the change

blockInstanceBefore - the instance of a block before it was changed

blockInstanceNow - the instance of a block after it has been changed

Soon when we release the alpha version, you can play around with the block definitions for yourself to optimize these things if you like

Water should simultaneously flow to the bottom and right, now the vertical flows faster then horizontal, maybe you could speed one up or slow the other down.To overcome the tessellation problem, you could create a flowing (opaque) effect, so you have less updates when water changes place.

Looks good but unfortunately the voxel design is getting beaten half to death Lol.

Fortunately for you must of them don't make it but this one actually seems more unique than shitecraft

I'm sick of seeing this attitude.

Yes, I'm sick of the in-it-for-the-money, poorly done clones of any game too, but I don't need to go around saying everywhere how I don't like it.

I honestly don't care if some random person doesn't like poorly done clones. If posted in response to a poorly-done clone, it's not like the creator is going to go and fix it. If posted in response to a well-done one, it has no meaning. Just keep your opinion to yourself and don't post until you find something constructive to say. Otherwise you're justing wasting people's time.

(Okay, I am venting at quite a lot of people right now, due to the recent drama around King/RoyalGames, Flappy Bird etc. Your comment was relatively okay, but I have to say this anyway)

So my first test with a cube of acid just burned all the way down to the bottom of the level. My next thought was to build a pool with a floor that won't be corroded by the acid and it turned out nicely. Here you can see how that looked like after some time:

Of course also in this case the acid never would have stoped burning through the rocks

Why don't you have the amount of acid decrease every time it burns through something? That way it will be self contained, also more realistic. So If a player is mining they could run into a packet of acid (That was contained by a certain of rock) and they would either have to let to create a hole, or try to contain it.

Looks good but unfortunately the voxel design is getting beaten half to death Lol.

Fortunately for you must of them don't make it but this one actually seems more unique than shitecraft

I know there are a lot of Minecraft clones that just try to quickly clone notch's success. Let me make one thing quite clear: I don't intend to do a blunt copy of MC, I see MC more as the first representative of a new game genre. A genre that didn't exist before simply because most of what MC does is cutting edge (even if it looks pixelated). That's by the way IMHO also the reason why most games are never finished/released. I don't know any game before MC that had the possibility to change the entire game's world, I mean there are games where you can change the level to a certain degree or even the whole level but not in this dimension!

With my game in particular the main difference to MC is that it is set in the future, has a storyline (though it's also open world) and an ending (which MC had not by the time I started Xcylin). But I also won't decline that it is of course inspired by MC a lot. But I see no point in recreating a game that already exists. So I think you will also see the main differences to MC when you get to play it this year

I hope you mean clones of mine craft by that - even that I would disagree with - it might be worth taking a look at Notch's status in the ratings board before you say anything rash about his baby.

I completely agree with you. But although I'm not entirely sure I think Gibbo3771 just refered with "shitecraft" to the poorly written rip offs of Minecraft and not Minecraft itself. Surely he knows that notch created a really remarkable game and if not he should look it up as it is all documented in this very forum!

Looks good but unfortunately the voxel design is getting beaten half to death Lol.

Fortunately for you must of them don't make it but this one actually seems more unique than shitecraft

I'm sick of seeing this attitude.

Yes, I'm sick of the in-it-for-the-money, poorly done clones of any game too, but I don't need to go around saying everywhere how I don't like it.

I honestly don't care if some random person doesn't like poorly done clones. If posted in response to a poorly-done clone, it's not like the creator is going to go and fix it. If posted in response to a well-done one, it has no meaning. Just keep your opinion to yourself and don't post until you find something constructive to say. Otherwise you're justing wasting people's time.

(Okay, I am venting at quite a lot of people right now, due to the recent drama around King/RoyalGames, Flappy Bird etc. Your comment was relatively okay, but I have to say this anyway)

Totally agree! And I'm as sick as you are about the recent Flappy Bird clone rush ...

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